All Quiet on the Western Front - Erich Maria RemarqueAll Quiet on the Western Front, by Erich Maria Remarque, is a story about World War I, and a young man who struggles to survive during it. The young man is Paul Baumer, he is a German in the Kaiser’s army, and he has no reason for fighting other than the fact that he signed up to.
When Paul did sign up, he was a zealous young man, full of plans and patriotism. In the ensuing years, though, he discovers the truth about the horrors of war, and about the people he is fighting against. Paul reads the name of a man he has killed and looks at the pictures of his family. Convinced that nothing can come from a war that sets good men against one another, Paul swears to fight for an end to needless killing in the world. However, he and many other disillusioned soldiers like him do not have the chance to: for them, peacetime never comes.
All Quiet on the Western Front completely destroys the popular illusion of “death and glory” on the battlefield. It handles controversial topics, like the morality and realities of war, with clarity and strong imagery. This book deserves a 10 out of 10 rating. I loved it. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes war novels or classics, or both.
I've only read one fourth of the book and I can already tell that I'm going to cry. Within the first chapter, you get the feeling that the characters wanted to fight for glory and all they finally understand in the end is that the glory that was perceived from battle is actually false. Nothing good can happen. People's limbs get blasted off, eyes get shot off, and blood is flying everywhere. It's scary think that what happens in the book actually happens in real battles. So far, I love the book. The characters are deep but even just from a bit of the war, their personalities are already fading. A shell is what they are turning into and I doubt that they will ever be fixed. I love the way the author portrays emotions. When the friend died, before you even got to know him, the main character and his other buddies all loved him but all they could do was talk about the guys boots and what they could do to move on and forget. It seems that during battle, moving on is the only way to live. When the new recruit was in his first battle and was "gun shy" and peed in his pants I imagine my father or another adult man doing that. It's hard to imagine at all that a man could be so scared to be like a child with a nightmare. This is a much more horrific dream, being reality, but it shocks the mind how war can affect a human so deeply. War is only destruction.
ReplyDeleteOkay...to start...this book is horrifying. The horses screaming with pain, the new recruit having a panic attack and being shot to death, bombs blowing people in peices, and the men alive not caring because they believe in nothing else but instinct. It's scary to realize how war really is. The voice from Paul is so strong because he really gets across the feeling of the change that happens because of war. Your family becomes a distant relation and your friends in your troop become your family. A mother becomes a mere acquaintance and you feel older then her. I don't think I could do it and honestly, they say war is only for men but it isn't for anyone. Dead or alive, everyone is dead.
ReplyDeleteIn addition to my last entry, I would like to say that no matter how hard you try to care about life, you can't. Life becomes a cage and it's all that really matters but you don't care anyway. You watch people die with frozen hearts because keeping them open will be your destruction. I feel and I honestly can't think of a life without them.
ReplyDeleteuhhh...Diana? You there?
ReplyDeleteHello Megan. I'm finally here (sorry for taking so long!).
ReplyDeleteYes, this book made me cry. At the end of the story especially, I had to stop to pull myself together. The book did more then make me feel 'sad', though. I was scared.
Most books, I try to imagine myself into the main character's place, to really understand the story. There was no way I could do that in AQOTWF. Firstly, I didn't want to imagine myself in a battle, and secondly, I couldn't imagine myself in a battle. I have never, ever experienced anything remotely like World War I, and I probably never will. Paul and his friends might have been like you and me, safe at home and reading books about horrible wars, but they had the misfortune to be put in a horrible war. Just like that, the fantasy of war became reality. What I cannot imagine became their reality.
They chose to do it though. It was their choice but I don't think they understood what they signed up for. I don't think any of the soldiers did. In battle, I would probably die of fright or get immediatly killed because I would freeze on the spot like a target...which I would be. I don't know, it almost sounds too awful to be true, even though it is.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading 3/4 of the book, I discovered that emotions do not exist in war. You lose a friend, suck it up. No matter how much you want to love, you want to remember, you want to befriend, it isn't in your best interest. Basically, that's exactly what you learn not do when you're a child. Learn to love, learn to remember, learn to befriend is what your taught to do. Everything about war goes against nature, except for humans being prone to violence. But we're are all taught to be civilized, eduacated, caring, and loving. That's how you survive in real life. If you toss that all out the window well, congratualtions, you are mentally capable of war. If anyone is naturally like that, he either has serious problems, or he is an oddity to the world. War brings out the worst of us. Or it kills.
ReplyDeleteWar is the king of destruction. Disease, old age, and accidents does not have the brutality and numbers of war. Paul Baumer in All Quiet on the Western Front, watches all sorts of everything die. Animals, comrades, enemies, earth, and friends.
ReplyDeleteHe starts out as a teenager ready to fight for his country and then he turns into an old man with a child's body. He faces guns, death, hopelessness, and madness. Only once does he ever falter. Paul faces all with a closed mind and a closed heart.
The whole book he fights for his life and cares for only that. As he ages by three years, he opens his heart to his friends. When his last friend get's shot in the leg, Paul carries him for miles. Little did he know that while he was carrying his friend, a stray shard lodged itself into his friends's head ultimately killing him. When Paul realized this, he died inside with only moving shell left.
Months later he died, peaceful, and ready for death.
One scene stuck with me through all of this. It was when Paul and his friends gathered together and talked about the war and their enemies. It was discovered that with one command, a friend could be turned into an enemy and with another, back into a friend all at the whim of power.